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What front panel connectors do I need for my case? Answered

Hi, am am building my first pc, and I need some advice with my case. I have some front panel connectors on my case that I don't know what I need to utilise them. I am using the Bitfenix Nova case. On that case,there is 1 usb 3.0, 1 usb 2.0, headphone and microphone jacks, power button, power and hdd leds. I don't want to mess this up and have a bunch of i/o that 1 can't use. Please help.Thanks.

As others have said , you need themanual for your motherboard to determine which headers go to which peripheral connectors. Every motherboard model is different, so relying on guesswork for answers is a bad bet.

Pfft! Who cares if you have a bunch of superfluous front panel connectors? It's a desktop. That means it's supposed to look like the control panel to a nuclear reactor.

If you wanted something sleek, streamlined, and pocket sized, then you'd buy some overpriced hand held thing, with a touch screen and no keyboard, and no headphone jack either, and fashionable name that starts with a lowercase "i".

I think I worded my question wrong, because I have 2 usb ports, audio jacks, a power button and 2 LEDs for power and the HDD built into my case. What I need to know is what internal motherboard connectors do I need to use all of those things

Well, the way to find what connectors (might be called "headers"?) your motherboard (MB) has, is to look up the manual for the MB. That manual can usually be found, in pdf form, published by the website of the manufacturer of the MB.

Anyway, once you have a copy of that manual, you can look in it, and discover a list of all the connectors it has. Also the manual will also have, sort of a map, or pictures showing the physical location of these connectors on the board, and how to orient the connectors too, for those where it is possible to put the connector on upside-down or backwards.

Either the headers will be marked directly on the motherboard and/or in the manual for it. There most likely will be a header for the switches and lights and then probably a couple of headers for additional USB ports.

It depends on what you want really. Motherboards have headers for the USB plugins (usually). Do you use memory cards for things like camera's? Then you should get a panel that has slots for those cards. Do you have a small slot, the one that fits a floppy drive, or do you have a full size one? Do you want SATA connectors so you can plug in hard drives? You can get all of that. And a fan controller also.

In my experience card readers that work on USB 2 sometimes don't work so good. But a lot of the cheap panels use USB 2 for the cards instead of USB 3. You have to specifically get one that says the cards are USB 3.

Thats not what I mean. I mean is that my case has 2 usb ports(1 3.0 and 1 2.0), 2 audio jacks, a power button and 2 LEDs for power and the HDD built into my case, and I don't know what internal motherboard headers I need to use them.

The little pamphlet that comes with the pother board has all that info, usually with a picture with words on it that identify all those things. Also the web site of the manufacturer has all that info and updated drivers also. But put it together before you worry about getting updates.